This blog is intended to go along with Population: An Introduction to Concepts and Issues, by John R. Weeks, published by Cengage Learning. The latest edition is the 12th (it came out in 2015), but this blog is meant to complement any edition of the book by showing the way in which demographic issues are regularly in the news.

If you are a user of my textbook and would like to suggest a blog post idea, please email me at: john.weeks@sdsu.edu

Tuesday, February 28, 2017

Will Trump Push for Legalization of Undocumented Immigrants?

A story today from the NYTimes suggests that the Trump administration may be willing to go along with a path to legalization for undocumented immigrants who have not committed a serious crime.

President Trump, signaling a potential major shift in policy, told news anchors on Tuesday that he is open to a broad immigration overhaul that would grant legal status to millions of undocumented immigrants who have not committed serious crimes.

“The time is right for an immigration bill as long as there is compromise on both sides,” the president told the TV anchors at the White House, according to people present during the discussion. The people requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about the private meeting.

When Ronald Reagan successfully proposed such an idea the concern was that legalization would simply encourage a new flood of undocumented immigrants to fill in the low income jobs that might be vacated by people with newly legal status. However, the demographic conditions are very different now that they were then. The birth rate has fallen steadily in Mexico (and in much of the rest of Central America) and Mexico no longer has a huge population of young adults needing to find work. Work has come to them at least partly because of NAFTA, if the truth be known, exemplified by news yesterday on NPR that a ball bearing plant in Indianapolis will be moving its 350 jobs from Indiana to Mexico, because of the difference in pay. One of the goals of NAFTA at the time the legislation was passed was to create a "wall of jobs" that would keep people in Mexico. That and a lower birth rate have, in fact, done precisely that. In the meantime, the economy of the U.S. would almost certainly be much better off with the kind of immigration reform that includes a path to legalization for people already here and participating in the labor force.

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Weeks Population Companion App

The app provides learning objectives and main points for each chapter, along with a quick POPquiz to test knowledge about key population information, and there is also a link to the WeeksPopulation blog.